By the Chairman of the Revolutionary War Council of the Republic and People’s Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs to the Forces of the Northern Front, April 20, 1919, No.89, Vologda

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Comrade soldiers, commanders, commissars!

Your meritorious army is protecting the Northern limits of the Republic from the encroachments of the foreign imperialists. The Russian White Guards are too insignificant and miserable, too much cut off from the masses, to be able to stand on their own feet. The workers’ and peasants’ power has been established by its own strength and survives by its own strength. Tie bourgeois bands are upheld only by the force of foreign bay nets.

The Soviet Government wants peace with all peoples. It has openly proposed peace to the British, French, Italian and American governments and to all their allies. Up to now, this offer has not been accepted. We are therefore obliged to defend, sword in bald, the property, freedom and independence of the workers’ and peasants’ country, against foreign aggression.

Kolchak’ partial successes on the Eastern front have again awakened ’all the hearts of the imperialist robbers the hope of defeating the Russian workers and peasants. That shall not be. The workers’ and peasants’ government have taken all measures necessary to crush Kolchak’s bands completely. You will receive new, in the next few weeks of a decisive change in the East and of our advance to the Urals.

Meanwhile, you will, as before, remain the loyal Northern sentinels of the Soviet Republic. The workers’ and peasants’ government is ready, as before, to put an end to the war formented by our enemies. But, at the same time, the whole country is filed with readiness to carry on with the hard struggle, until Soviet territory has been completely cleared of counter-revolutionary forces. In the severe natural conditions of the North, in struggle against a richly-supplied enemy, you, soldiers of the Northern front, have already succeeded in covering your banners with glory. The love and warm support of the whole country accompany your fight.